If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Finally finished Peter F. Hamilton's Night's Dawn trilogy (+/- 3300 pages!) which literally took me nearly 3 years because I only read a bit at night before going to sleep. It was a pretty good (if long-winded) series, but I much preferred his Commonwealth Saga and Void Trilogy (listened to both as audio books). All Hamilton's books have multiple intertwined plots and many interesting, well developed, likeable characters. Plus BIG SPACE DRAMA and lots of conflict at all scales! Which I love when it is done well.

Current bedtime reading is back to Game of Thrones Book 5. I'm about half way through, reading on iPad. At this point, I'm slightly bored but not enough to quit reading. Also I keep hoping that more about my favourite character Arya will be offered.

In the studio or out walking/driving, I'm listening to The Girl Who Played With Fire (second in Steig Larsson's Millennium Trilogy) and have the third book queued up. Such an excellent, excellent series...I am going to hate it when that third book ends. I admire the character Lisbeth Salander so much. The first book (Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) was a by far better than the movie. I don't think I would have like the movie without having read the book.

Recently I listened to Endymion by Dan Simmons and now I want to listen to all four Hyperion series books from start to finish...in the right sequence :P

I prefer audio books over actual reading; good narrators can bring so much to the story. Plus I can do other stuff while listening. It's hard to set aside time just for reading--usually 15-20 minutes before bed is about all I can usually cram into my day.

finished "The Fall of Hyperion" (2nd book of Dan Simmons' Hyperion Cantos) recently. Still pondering whether i should go on with pt.3 Endymion next or wait a bit with that :P (got sidetracked by ME3 ;D)

Can anyone recommend some bad books? As in, utterly horrible, wish-you-hadn't-bothered pieces of trash? Not just something you didn't like, but just plain bad with no redeeming qualities.

Dale Brown's later books.

Flight of the Old Dog was awesome, and it went steadily downhill after that point. Unfortunately, he wrote so much stuff that his writing is truly terrible now.

Oh and obligatory James Patterson, but everyone knows that James Patterson is actually a self-aware AI that shits out generic books perfectly focussed at some sort of demographic that always sell well.

Personally I thought too much of Girl With the Dragon Tattoo read like Larsson masturbating furiously over what a brilliant super journalist & woman magnet his alter ego Blomkvist is, especially the epilogue. I liked that the (Swedish. I haven't seen the US version yet) movie cut out some of the excesses of that. The Girl Who Played With Fire manages to be even more absurd plotwise, but somehow stays on the right side of ridiculous to be enjoyable rather than insulting. Also haven't read Hornets Nest yet. It is the thickest of the 3 books, & frankly that leads me to suspect it's the one where Larsson's inner editor gave way to his megalomania. Assuming his wife didn't write them all, that is.

good series, steam fantasy with a good dose of politics/warfare and an intriguing setup

The series is set in a hypothetical universe populated by different kinden. Each kinden is a fictional race of humans, named after (and having certain characteristics of) an insect. Kinden are typically divided into two categories : Apt and Inapt. The Apt do not have magical abilities, but are able to understand, use and design mechanical devices. The Inapt have varying amounts of magical abilities, but cannot use mechanical devices, even those as simple as latches. The series focuses on the attempted conquest of the lowlands by the Wasp-kinden empire.

Can anyone recommend some bad books? As in, utterly horrible, wish-you-hadn't-bothered pieces of trash? Not just something you didn't like, but just plain bad with no redeeming qualities.

Ulysses by James Joyce.

I read it all the the way to end just to say I had, and I really wish I hadn't bothered.

In my view it's the most over-rated novel in the English language because although it does have some awesomely written sentences Joyce doesn't seem to understand that a novel is more than a collection of sentences.

Can anyone recommend some bad books? As in, utterly horrible, wish-you-hadn't-bothered pieces of trash? Not just something you didn't like, but just plain bad with no redeeming qualities.

Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson: The Butlerian Jihad (Legends of Dune, Book 1)
There are very few books in my life i couldn't read to the end, and this one is one of them. Truly horrible book.
And note that i'm a HUUUUUGE Dune universe fan, the setting is beyond awesome.